Lately I've been putting in a lot of hours working. And I've also been brainstorming with the spousal unit on a theory of ours that would put to good use some of the crap science that's been looming on the fringes of Global Warming for the past decade. Hippies aren't the only ones that can benefit from crap scientific method.
The kind of work I do is sometimes the most mind-numbing stuff you could ever imagine, but I stick the iPod on play and consider it idea time. It's amazing at what you can think about when you're thinking about something that means nothing. No, I'm not suddenly espousing Sartre and the whole Nihilism cult... I'm just saying that when you aren't really thinking, your mind is still percolating. Recognizing it is what brings those ideas to the fore and you find you can really use them. It's not like I'm cheating billable hours, it's a serendipitous effect of what I do.
Years ago I had a job that required me to constantly think on my feet. My brain had no time to ideate at all, unless it was to anticipate the next crisis in an attempt to minimize the effects it would have on my addlepated boss. After years in that kind of Workplace Bosnia, I had to get out. One day my boss went a little too far in his attempt to make me accept the blame for his inability to do his job any longer and I walked. The job I had once loved was now something I could just walk away from. The mental challenges were no longer enough to keep me covering up for him with clients. In other words, I wasn't paid enough to do his job and mine and I woke up to it one day.
The jobs we do... it's like this, we are told we should put in 110%, go the extra mile, however, the current view is that workers are a resource to be exploited, they are a dime a dozen, with hundreds lined up to take any position. We are just interchangeable parts. Cogs in the machine. Now, I will concede, there are some jobs that are just that... throw enough retarded monkeys at it and they can do the job between them, and there are always more retarded monkeys. But the thing is, the one smart monkey who figures out a better and faster way to do his job will NOT be rewarded, he will be exploited by a less than moral boss.
A good boss is one who recognizes the ability of the worker, and pays him more money for finding that better and faster way to do things. He might promote him to find other ways in which things could be done better and faster and maximize profit, so that he could hire more retarded monkeys who would then have more money to spend on Bling and cell phone plans.
The less than scrupulous boss gives this employee a mention in the quarterly company newsletter that no one in the company reads and a $50 gift card, and keeps the maximized profits higher by then laying off retarded monkeys who no longer have to try to do their jobs before one of them got it right. Thus, never really making things better or faster for anyone at the job. And since they don't get decent pay, don't get raises or promotions, the able people leave for greener pastures and the employer never gets ahead of himself because he can't see past the slightly maximized profit of any money saving effort someone "discovers".
But he will go before anyone who will listen and talk about how great he is for his efforts to save paper or the whales or whatever fad he and his other mercantilists buddies are into for the gubmint cheddah. And everyone will think what an OK guy he is and how wonderful he is to mention his employees in their company newsletters.
You know, I am perhaps one of the most competitive people I know. Given a goal I will work my hardest to achieve it, then overcome it time and again. However, I have to see something for it. I need my cheddar, my cheese to get me to do it again and again. However, if I keep getting the same cheese for better results, pretty soon I will give you the barest minimum to keep getting my cheese. If you don't reward me I will quit performing.
Period.
It's not that I want a freakin marching band parade every time I beat a goal. Just give me what I want, what I ask for. Chances are it won't be anything outrageous or non-commensurate with the work I did to achieve the goal. Many people on this planet are not greedy. Many people are willing to perform a task to receive a reward. Those who aren't are retarded monkeys. Are you sensing my theme?
Motivation. It is what drives us. If you don't have it, you aren't living. You're sitting around waiting to die.
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